23 Tequila Cocktail Recipes

Agave spirits are the most agricultural things on the shelf. A blue agave takes six to eight years to mature before it is harvested, roasted and fermented, and you can taste that patience: tequila is peppery, herbaceous and faintly sweet in a way grain spirits never quite manage. Blanco is unaged and the default for cocktails, bright and vegetal and direct. Reposado spends a few months in oak and softens into vanilla and caramel, which suits stirred, spirit-forward drinks. Anejo is usually better sipped than mixed. Mezcal, made from any of dozens of agave varieties and roasted over wood in earthen pits, adds smoke and is worth a half-measure in almost anything as a seasoning rather than a base. Agave loves lime and salt. That is the whole logic of the Margarita and the Paloma, and it is why a good tequila drink tastes savoury and quenching rather than sweet. Always check the label says 100% agave.